Excerpt
IT WAS NOT a very white jacket, but white enough, in all conscience, as the sequel will show. The way I came by it was this. When our frigate lay in Callao, on the coast of Peru—her last harbor in the Pacific—I found myself without a grego, or sailor's surtout; and as, toward the end of a three years' cruise, no pea-jackets could be had from the purser's steward; and being bound for Cape Horn, some sort of a substitute was indispensable; I employed myself, for several days, in manufacturing an outlandish garment of my own devising, to shelter me from the boisterous weather we were so soon to encounter. It was nothing more than a white duck frock, or rather shirt; which, laying on deck, I folded double at the bosom, and by then making a continuation of the slit there, opened it lengthwise—much as you would cut a leaf in the last new novel. The gash being made, a metamorphosis took place, transcending any related by Ovid. For, presto! the shirt was a coat!—a strange-looking coat, to be sure; of a Quakerish amplitude about the skirts; with an infirm, tumble-down collar; and a clumsy fullness about the wristbands; and white, yea, white as a shroud. And my shroud it afterward came very near proving, as he who reads further will find.

Table of Contents
· Chapter 1. The Jacket
· Chapter 2. Homeward-Bound
· Chapter 3. A Glance at the principal Divisions, into which a Man-of-war's Crew is divided
· Chapter 4. Jack Chase
· Chapter 5. Jack Chase on a Spanish Quarter-deck
· Chapter 6. The Quarter-deck Officers, Warrant Officers, and Berth-deck Underlings of a Man-of-war; where they Live in
the Ship; how they Live; their Social Standing on Ship-board; and what sort of Gentlemen they are
· Chapter 7. Breakfast, Dinner, and Supper
· Chapter 8. Selvagee contrasted with Mad-Jack
· Chapter 9. Of the Pockets that were in the Jacket
· Chapter 10. From Pockets to Pickpockets
· Chapter 11. The Pursuit of Poetry under Difficulties
· Chapter 12. The Good or Bad Temper of Men-of-war's men, in a great Degree, attributable to their Particular Stations and
Duties aboard Ship
· Chapter 13. A Man-of-war Hermit in a Mob
· Chapter 14. A Drought in a Man-of-war
· Chapter 15. A Salt-Junk Club in a Man-of-war, with a Notice to Quit
· Chapter 16. General Training in a Man-of-war
· Chapter 17. Away! Second, Third, and Fourth Cutters, away!
· Chapter 18. A Man-of-war Full as a Nut
· Chapter 19. The Jacket aloft
· Chapter 20. How they Sleep in a Man-of-war
· Chapter 21. One Reason why Men-of-war's-men are, generally, Short-lived
· Chapter 22. Wash-day, and House-cleaning in a Man-of-war
· Chapter 23. Theatricals in a Man-of-war
· Chapter 24. Introductory to Cape Horn
· Chapter 25. The Dog-days off Cape Horn
· Chapter 26. The Pitch of the Cape
· Chapter 27. Some Thoughts growing out of Mad Jack's Countermanding his Superior's Order
· Chapter 28. Edging Away
· Chapter 29. The Night-watches
· Chapter 30. A Peep through a fort-hole at the Subterranean Parts of a Man-of-war
· Chapter 31. The Gunner under Hatches
· Chapter 32. A Dish of Dunderfunk
· Chapter 33. A Flogging